- “When there is a death we don’t know how to explain it to children, teachers are also afraid to address the issue, because of the opinions they can receive from families...” To address these deficiencies, Professor and psychopedagogue Naroa Martínez has launched a collection of signatures in which she calls for teachers to be trained in mourning and in the pedagogy of death.
Naroa Martínez, advisor on death and mourning in Primary Education, sees that the issue is very present, that generates concern, and that wants to help, but that many times we do not know how to respond to the situation.
“Death is the only safe experience we have, we all go to it, it’s part of our daily lives,” and it’s essential to talk about it and work on the grieving process of death. “The pedagogy of death can prevent pathological grief in children, because everything we speak naturally helps not to pathologize and to live the grief naturally,” says Martínez.
“I am extinguishing fires, I do what I can”
He has started a collection of signatures on the network requesting training on this subject for teachers and making an invitation to work on death in the annual plan for the school curriculum, questioning the politicians of the Basque Parliament. In all centers, the professor has also called for the creation of individualized protocols for the education of death and mourning, as well as the establishment of an expert in the Berritzegune: “At the Berritzegune he worked on death and mourning and there was an expert who offered training and since he retired, that public figure is missing. Almost every day teachers and families come to me, but I am shutting down the hogueras, I do what I can and if that public figure is consolidated, the help would be broader, reaching more families and educational centers.”